Unofficial Partner Podcast
Unofficial Partner Podcast
UP478 UP Live in Lausanne: How much entertainment can sport take?
A live recording of the Unofficial Podcast, on stage at the Olympic Museum for The SPOT conference.
Guests
Jo Redfern, Futrhood
Damjan Rudež, Former NBA player & Sunset Sports Media Festival Program Director
Michael D'hurst, founder and CEO of SuperTri
Matt Wilkinson, Creative Director of Entertainment at Whisper
Featuring Ana Jelusic Black, who in addition to being the organiser of the event, is herself a three time Olympian and World Cup alpine ski champion.
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Hi there. Richard Gillis here and welcome to Unofficial Partner. This is a special live episode. We went to Lanne, to the Olympic Museum to take part in a session run at the Spot, which was a conference I've not been to before. Very good. It was too, we had a great panel. Joe Redfern, former BBC Children's Producer now runs Future Hood Consulting. Damien Rues, former Croatian, Olympian, NBA player, and now director of the Sunset Sports Media Festival program. Michael Durst, who's a founder and chief executive officer of Super Tri the uh, triathlon series, and Matt Wilkinson, who is Creative Director of entertainment programming at wis who runs things like the BBC sports. Personality of the Year, FIFA Awards, and he'd just come from the, uh, team launch of the British and Irish Lions. So great panel and a good subject. And, as you'll hear, a very engaged audience. But the first person you'll hear is Anna JE Black. who in addition to being the organizer of the event, is herself a three time Olympian and World Cup Alpine Ski Champion and was Croatia. Youngest ever Olympian. I think that's right at the age of 15. So welcome to the spot.
multitrack_HandMic1:Thank you for your patience. We have been advertising our next session as a live session, so there you go. The setup is live as well as Kine mentioned this morning. There's a spot of many firsts is the first time we have been here at the Olympic Museum, as we continue with our program for the first time ever at the spot, it is my absolute pleasure to introduce a live recording of the unofficial podcast here on stage at the Olympic Museum. Please welcome Richard Gillis for a conversation that I think we are all very excited about. How much entertainment can sport take, Richard? Thank you. Thanks very much. I'm Richard Gillis and I, I spotted a few unofficial partner listeners in the audience. And if you don't already, you should. It's uh, it's really good. That's the sales message over. I'm gonna invite my illustrious panel onto the stage. I wanna give'em a round of applause and we come, okay. Now this subject.
multitrack_HandMic3:it's
multitrack_HandMic1:about sport and entertainment. It's about the difference between sport and entertainment. And it's about movements in the sports media marketplace and how that is shaping
multitrack_HandMic2:what
multitrack_HandMic1:what sport is and what it's going to be. I was, a Financial Times Summit this time last year.
multitrack_HandMic5:and
multitrack_HandMic1:And a guy called Greg Peters, who I've never heard of, I don't expect you to know him. He's a Netflix executive and. He created a new word. There are not enough words in English language. He created a new one. He said that
multitrack_HandMic3:Netflix
multitrack_HandMic1:are interested in sport and we can see that they've started to buy certain rights. They're bits of NFL. There's, there's some WWE. There's boxing of a sort that they're interested in. The women fifa Women's World Cup is another big ticket item that Netflix has invested in. But there's a caveat, and the caveat is that they want to Netflix FY Sport. Now We are in a temple of sport with a big capital S here. Okay. This was created and this was built by television money and. My daughter doesn't watch television in the same way as I did, and I've, there is a nagging doubt that runs through a podcast like ours through which reflects a, a sort of generational anxiety, gen, alpha, gen Z, fear that they're not gonna consume sport in the same way as I did. And perhaps people on our panel did. And perhaps you did. And then what happens, we're gonna park the commercial question for a minute because I want to get into the detail of actually, what does this mean. So if Netflix, and we're using them as a sort of proxy into the conversation about platforms of various types, non-traditional broadcasters. What does it mean what are they asking of sports? I'm gonna ask each of our group, before we do that, I'm gonna ask them to sort of talk about this idea of Netflixing sport. Just pause that for a minute.'cause I wanna just, very quickly, I wanna do, what do you do all day? So Joe, I'm gonna start with you. Just let's, let's share who you are and what you do.
multitrack_HandMic4:My name's Joe. I've spent the best part of the past 20 years making content for kids. So I've worked at Disney a spell at WE and a chunk of time at BBC Children's in the uk. And what that has given me and now I increasingly apply to sport, is an insight into how the younger generations consume sport media and wear this notion of social thirst fandom. The fact that they use YouTube as their default search engine and what sports media means to them, which as you just said is very different to what it means to previous generations. So now I've pivoted from that into helping federations and sports rights owners really understand how to reach, engage, monetize, where possible young people with sports media across all of those platforms.
multitrack_HandMic1:Excellent. Right. Michael, what do you do all day?
multitrack_HandMic5:I think and do triathlon all day
multitrack_HandMic1:You look like you do for the last,
multitrack_HandMic5:for the last, for the last 30 years, but no, the, these times we are developing an ecosystem in short course triathlons. So I have professional racing where we inspire people and we drive them to participate and build a, a growing portfolio of mass participation events in triathlon. But all short course. Okay.
multitrack_HandMic3:Damian.
multitrack_HandMic1:Damien.
multitrack_HandMic3:Hi everyone. Damian Rudi. Well, up to three years ago I spent my days playing basketball all around the world. Played professionally for about 18 years, all around the world. 14 different teams in seven different countries. And then after playing professional sports, I pivoted to business and sport business. And now I organize and co-own Sunset Sports Festival, which is a sport business conference happening in Croatia in about a month. So it's a three day event. We've been doing it for four years now, so it has given me a new life, a new fulfillment, a new identity. So I kind of, keep myself busy and occupied and entertained with everything related to organizing such a, such a big event.
multitrack_HandMic5:And
multitrack_HandMic1:I've seen the photos and they look sensational For someone who doesn't come out of a podcast booth it looks great.
multitrack_HandMic3:Thank you. Thank you.
multitrack_HandMic2:Hi I'm Matt Wilkinson. I'm one of the creative directors at uk based production company, whisper. We do broadcast production documentaries, live events for the likes of Wimbledon Roland Garros Formula One Professional Fighters League, PGA tour for streamers including Netflix Amazon, et cetera, et cetera. But we're a, we're a London based company, but with a, I guess, a global footprint.
multitrack_HandMic1:Okay. Right. Let's get to this question then of what does Netflix want? What is Netflix iffy? When you heard that word, Joe, what did you think? What came to your mind?
multitrack_HandMic5:Interesting.
multitrack_HandMic4:So yes. What does to Netflix, I mean, or YouTube. I whate whatever.
multitrack_HandMic1:or Roblox iffy
multitrack_HandMic4:or Roblox Fire.
multitrack_LecternAmbiance:or Roblox.
multitrack_HandMic4:I think from Netflix's point of view, in terms of how they apply what they do to sport, it's about bringing audience, bringing subscribers or stemming churn or increasingly the metrics that they report, they've actually stopped reporting subscriber numbers because now it's about time spent, which is what, that's the value that they sell to their advertisers. That's really interesting because as, as you referred to, you know, that might mean that sport, Netflixing sport means bringing in YouTubers. We had the Paul Tyson fight because Jake Paul has got 21 million subscribers on his YouTube channel and Netflix had quite like a portion of those. So in terms of Netflixing sport, I think if we're talking about entertainment and sport merging, I think that was probably a very good recent example of what that verb potentially meant when that chap spoke about it at your conference a year ago.
multitrack_HandMic1:Okay. Right. Michael, I, there's an obvious worry that it isn't actually sporty. Um, Joe mentioned there boxing and that's got, you know, the Tyson Paul fight. Is it sport? I'm wondering what's gonna happen? What does it want? When you look at that from your perspective, your embedded in sport, proper sport as I would call it.
multitrack_HandMic5:Thank you. I like that. Proper sport. Proper sport. Um, No, I think, I think next Netflix is a, it's an opportunity,
multitrack_HandMic1:we, we, by the way, we don't, we, after this session, we just need to forget that word. Okay.
multitrack_HandMic5:No, but I think as
multitrack_HandMic1:is, you know, we don't need to listen to him. We don't, no one knows who he is. So,
multitrack_HandMic3:So
multitrack_HandMic5:It's I, I think many rights holders see it as a, as a golden goose somehow. But I think it's an opportunity because. Back in the day when I was young, we watched the game. It was a 90 minute game on television, and that's pretty much the only thing we watched and we saw the players. I think for me, the opportunity is now you create much more narrative. So you, you actually create a much wider audience for your support. Suddenly you start knowing who are the mechanics, you, you know more about the coaches, you know more about the private lives of the different athletes, which humanizes it. And I think, obviously I believe in, in, in real sports through sports, but it's an opportunity to attract an audience and drive them back to, to the sport. And then actually yeah, giving more depth and more storylines and content around it. So I see it as an opportunity.
multitrack_HandMic1:Super Tri is a shortening of triathlon. Am I right in in that?
multitrack_HandMic5:Yes, yes. I mean, it's, it is again, focused on the audience. So what we've done to triathlon is not only shortened it, we also changed the formats. It's still swim, bike, run, but we do three back to back and we race on a one mile loop. So from a, from an audience, from a fan on the ground. You get the athletes coming by every 60 seconds. And from a, from a, from a media perspective, it's, it's very compact, very intense, very technical. So it's, it's a new, it's an improvement on, on the what's good for Netflix, I guess, or what is good for media for and for wider audiences to make the sport more attractive.
multitrack_HandMic1:Okay. Damien, you are sort of playing a role here and I know I'm gonna put you into this box, but I'd love to know what this looks like, this question from a professional athlete's perspective.
multitrack_HandMic3:Yeah. Well, I look at the whole Netflixing thing from, from two different perspectives. I would say from one side, it seems like it's an absolute masterclass in storytelling and, you know, sports, media production, obviously you attach a little bit of drama, you show face of the main characters. You, you know, you develop a good storyline and you kind of throw it out there for the crowd to, to consume it. That's one side, which is obviously the positive side. The kind of, I wouldn't even say negative side, but a different perspective to it is there's just an abundance of content out there and it's so easily digestible. So then it's like, does it really have a tremendous value? That's, I would say my first two associations when it comes to Netflixing as we're now validating is a, as a term.
multitrack_HandMic4:there's a
multitrack_HandMic1:of pressure on athletes to be creators. So we're gonna get into the creator economy. We're gonna talk about, you know, Mr. Beast, we're gonna talk about individuals versus teams versus tournaments. You know that in that marketplace. A professional basketball player, a professional athlete. It looks pretty hard work from where I'm standing.
multitrack_HandMic3:Pretty time consuming. Yeah, pretty energy consuming.
multitrack_HandMic1:So if a marketing company comes along and Netflix comes along, or YouTube come along and say, do you know what, you'd be better. You, we need some more content from you Demi, and we need you to be look at Mr. Beast, do a bit of what that's, there's an incentive there for you, but I wonder what the implications are there.
multitrack_HandMic3:there? Absolutely. Is it all? I would say it depends on which level of athlete you are in. I mean, which you, are you the superstar? Are you a guy that needs more attention? Are you, you know, a small level guy in a small sport that kind of needs to put himself out there? So there's different, different layers to it. Obviously it's not the same for a guy who has$200 million on his contract and he really doesn't wanna do stuff. But then again, he has the pressure of having to do stuff. So that's kind of the, the, the twofold situation that they find themselves in. When I was a player, I know very well what it meant when people would take away from my time and from my liberties and from my concentration on sports, it's like, I don't really wanna do this. Like, do I really have to do this? I don't really want to. But now with obviously Netflix and all these platforms and multi-channel content coming through you know, our phones, our ears and our eyes, you really feel pressured as an athlete and you find yourself in a situation, okay, I kind of have to put myself out there. But then again, it depends on the level of sports in which you find yourself in.
multitrack_HandMic5:in.
multitrack_HandMic4:If I may just jump in. I think that is a really interesting point of view as, as an athlete who was being asked to be a creator, I do think we'll see a generation of athletes coming through who consider themselves as much a creator as an athlete because they've had one of these since they started their athlete journey, and it's been second nature to them. Very often kids are inherent creators. They've got studios and the means of distribution in their pocket. So actually it could be that we've got a, a generation of elite athletes coming through for whom that's just been part of their journey. The interesting tension that will bring is then potentially they will have an avid fan base when they reach elite level and they're being asked to do the marketing stuff and they'll say, no, that doesn't feel genuine or authentic to my audience. And they might start pushing back against some of those more commercial asks, if it doesn't, if it doesn't vibe with their audience.
multitrack_HandMic2:Right.
multitrack_HandMic1:gonna come back to that'cause there's a bit in there that I want to sort of develop, which is about the relationship between creators and audiences. Matt, let's just get your first point on the, you know, the general point that we're making about the incentives in the marketplace now.
multitrack_HandMic5:Well,
multitrack_HandMic2:I think obviously you have to be quite careful'cause we do quite a lot work with Netflix.
multitrack_HandMic1:Let's, let's talk about a different one. Well, we'll, we'll de next Netflix
multitrack_HandMic2:I think well let's, let's just, I think just talk about streamers to answer your question, whoever it is, I think they wanna own everything they want. You know, they are we all, it's probably fairly common knowledge that I imagine when F1 writes come up, Netflix will be in for that. You know, you saw what they did with the Super Bowl or sorry, the NFL game on Christmas Day. Right. They're dipping their toe. They're ironing out all the little technical problems, albeit to 200 million households around the world, I imagine with a view to going in for. More NFL rights. I imagine there's a reason that they haven't gone for Premier League rights right now, because at the moment the technology is not robust enough to be able to stream. What do we have? 19 games, a a weekend in the Premier League, and they'll, once that's ironed out, I imagine they would jump in with two feet and they're therefore all of the storytelling that they're doing now. And I think I, you know, whether it's Amazon or, or, you know,
multitrack_HandMic5:know, my, my
multitrack_HandMic2:joked with, with everyone else here, my 14-year-old son is obsessed. He will not watch TV with me. Maybe that's, Jessica doesn't wanna watch it with me, but he will watch, he will watch documentaries about LeBron, about NFL, rugby, full contact, all this stuff. And obviously he's getting to know all of these people. He's getting to know that sport unbelievably well. So therefore, when the live games come up, he was able to tell me about every single player in the live NFL game on Christmas Day. So the two things go hand in hand. And once, if you can convert the storytelling into the live. You asked us earlier about athletes being storytellers and content creators. It's all interwoven for me and And that's only going to get even more. So I wouldn't call it a gray area. I don't think it is. I think it's, they both become self-perpetuating.
multitrack_HandMic1:There's a bit of a weird, we're at a weird time. I think with a, there's a sort of collision between the creators and again, proper sport or proper television, sports, television. And when I see, so there's a golf example. Rick Shields is a golf, you know, creator, very successful, biggest YouTube golfer or you know, golf YouTuber.
multitrack_HandMic5:YouTuber.
multitrack_HandMic1:And then so Sky are now using him in there. Broadcast when they appear on television, something odd happens, you know, and it's to do with, I guess, our relationship with the creator. It's different than a television
multitrack_HandMic2:Yeah. Just very quickly, I, I think it's a really good point. Again, a lot of what I produced and, and and Whisper have done is that, is that blend between live broadcast and, and the fan, and again, we were talking about this beforehand, depends what you are. If you are trying to sell tickets or create value for social media and, and eyeballs for social media, then you, you tend to book, if that's the right word, cast people who fall into that bracket, but they tend not to convert into long form television. I know ITV in the UK and the BBC are, you know, strictly come dancing or dancing with the stars, whatever. Always will try and book someone who, you know, in their words, not mine, you know, brings, you know, a social media following. Right. And Joe can talk much better than I can. But that doesn't, that doesn't tend to add one single eyeball to the, to the actual long form TV broadcast.
multitrack_HandMic4:for me it's because there are different need states being served across those different channels. So you don't lift and shift what Mr. Beast does on YouTube and expect it to work on, on linear broadcast. So really that, what that translates to when I'm speaking to rights holders about sports media is thinking about telling your story across all of those different platforms. It might be on TikTok, it's a 15 second piece of content that normally is around. A goal, a life hack, a piece of drama, something, and then you can go. If, if that then tempts them across to the YouTube channel, then they swim around in content. There's, I'm gonna, I'm gonna say it. People say that kids' attention spans have shortened, they haven't. It's the interest spans that have shortened. So you've gotta think about getting and maintaining their interest. If you can maintain their interest, whether it's a 15 second TikTok or swimming around in a YouTube channel, then their attention spans are fine. They're just as long as they ever were. It's the interest spans that have shortened
multitrack_HandMic1:You did a podcast with Evan Shapiro, and it was really interesting. I recommend everyone, it wasn't one of our podcasts, but here's me being generous about someone else's podcast. So I'm a nice man, but there was an interesting bit. He mentioned that there were 9 million interesting, or of YouTube channels of substance.
multitrack_HandMic4:There's actually 110 million YouTube channels. But yes, the, the ones that are active, that are the kind of the top of the tree are about that 9 million mark. But when we look at kids' behaviors, and again, I use kids' behaviors as a proxy for direction of, of, of travel for sports media, then it's, it's their go-to, it's their video platform of choice and increasingly being consumed through connected tv. So it's eating live sports lunch there in the US it's already about 50% of YouTube consumption in the home is done through the connected TV in the uk. When I was checking the stats, it's 40, 42 percentage. So that's the direction of travel. So again, this is the operating context in which sports media now exists, and that requires us to think a slightly different way about how we articulate that media, that storytelling across all of those platforms.
multitrack_HandMic3:point.
multitrack_HandMic1:There's a question here that I think is about, so we talked there, what's the quote again? Attention and not
multitrack_HandMic4:interest spans have shortened. Not attention spans.
multitrack_HandMic1:Interest spans of shortened not attention, but it needs a bit of work that I need to, I, it doesn't roll off the tongue, but I I get it. I, I get where you're coming from. So
multitrack_HandMic4:do
multitrack_HandMic1:we conflate length of content? Do we assume the obvious sort of preconceptions or biases that I have is that everything's becoming shorter. We need to catch their attention. Content needs to be short Because they can't concentrate. So this goes against that. But are we getting that wrong? Do we think? Because when people get to piece of content, they're staying on it, but is that what you see?
multitrack_HandMic5:Yeah, I, I would, I would agree with that. I think that it's, it's context. I think there's certain content that needs to be short and, and it's, it's focused on that. We also see a lot of, I. A longer form content, and I, I say 10 to 15 minute pieces of that actually tackle a specific topic where we've generated the interest and, and the young audience or older audience is interested in a topic and they will see the whole content piece through. I think it's, it's, the landscape is obviously very diverse, so we need to, we need to really look at what contents do we put where, what is the purpose of that content in there? What is the length that fits with that piece of content and how does it kind of drive? So it's, it's, you have to be quite strategic with the different channels. As a, as a rights holder, you have to be very strategic and you have very different, a lot of wide spectrum of channels to cater for and, and making sure that what you do there is, is actually specific to that channel to make it work. You can't, you can't stream a whole, yeah, you can't stream a whole game on, on TikTok, for example, that that won't work.
multitrack_HandMic1:there's a, there's, I wonder, and this is a question coming to you, Matt in a minute, which is the drive to survive question. It's always there in a sports meeting. You can't have a sport business podcast and not mention it. It's almost like a sort of bingo call. But every sport, 18 months, two years ago, were saying, right. You know, there were demand for longer form documentary, the Drive to survive model. We have to have one of those, and every Olympic sport went in, pursuit a great time to be a documentary sports documentary maker. But what does it work for you, Michael? Is that, is that something, did you look at that trend and say, yeah, okay, we need to jump onto that? Yeah,
multitrack_HandMic5:Yeah, we jumped on that and, and we made a, a number of pieces that were, that were very good in the long form. I would actually go a step further. I think there's, it is not only platform, but there's also the actors. I mean, certain, a certain athletes or influences will, will play better with the short piece of content and that actually go well there. And other athletes or actors or, or it's a layer cake of different narratives in any sport. Now they, they will have the different actors and different formats that play on the different, on the different channels and, and they all, they all serve a purpose. So I wouldn't say longform is out a trend now. There is still a purpose for longform. There was definitely two years ago where we probably did a bit too much. We do a little less now and we focus more on the, on the YouTube shorts or on the tiktoks, et cetera. But yeah, it's not one or the other. They're all combined. Okay.
multitrack_HandMic1:Matt, what was that? What's that market?'cause I imagine a lot of people come to you and say, M and do us a drive to
multitrack_HandMic2:yeah, they do. I mean, you know. Well done. Box to box. You know, they're, the phone probably doesn't stop ringing, but I think the, the real important story is, is a, a friend of mine is head of marketing for the RFU. So looks after in and rugby team and, and, and, and all of that good stuff. So they were approached and agreed to doing a six Nations behind the scenes called Full Contact. I'm a big rugby fan and this guy who should remain nameless, but I mean, he's the head of marketing for England Rugby, if you want to Google him. He basically said, he basically said that the, the issue is,
multitrack_HandMic1:is like a crap detective. Serious.
multitrack_HandMic2:The issue is that. You need the buy-in. This might sound incredibly obvious, you need the buy-in from the players, not just from the from the, the organizations or the federations. And, you know, not everyone. We, I mentioned earlier again, like not everyone is Usain Bolt, right? And I think that, that the generation of athletes that have come in and expected to have a pose or a walkout track or, you know, whatever that don't, that don't exist. He was, he was almost a one-off. And when you go to rugby players who have sort of spent their life growing up and being told you are part of a team, nobody puts their head above. And it's very different from American sports stars. And I'm not saying one's right, one's wrong, but it does make it hard. And I think even if you go back to drive to survive, I think I'm right in saying Ferrari and Mercedes at the start. Didn't wanna do it. Max Stepin still doesn't wanna do it. I mean, that's maybe because he's got his own content deal, but they're not all, they are not all extroverts. They are not all people that enjoy putting themselves out there. And I think that's why some don't, I was really disappointed with, with the, with full contact, but that's not because of the quality, it's just the access isn't the same. So you just gotta be mindful of that.
multitrack_HandMic1:got cut didn't it?
multitrack_HandMic2:two series. And they, well, they were, they were, I was amazed. Even so even the coaches were kind of saying, give us the cameras. We'll film it for you. You imagine box to box going on. Don't think you've sort of understood how this works. But you know, they clo this just, they just weren't used to it. And you know, again, with the rugby example, different coaches come in at different times. I think even if you look at all all or nothing, you know, pep, Guardiola and Mikel or Tetter, just introverts, weirdly by nature. So it's horses for courses. Also, it
multitrack_HandMic1:it becomes a version of itself. People start to perform for they if you know, the cameras are there. Damien, I wonder if, you know, when the cameras come into the dressing room, it feels like we are coming into hallow ground. But actually you start to behave differently, presumably.
multitrack_HandMic3:Absolutely. It changes the air in the room. It absolutely does. I mean, I had a chance of witnessing from two different perspectives when I was a player I used to hate, and that was the beginning of all right, camera is getting into the locker room. Even in the NBA, obviously there's mandatory access time when, you know, press is allowed there and you see certain guys' behaviors change immediately as soon as the camera walks in. So I've seen it happen multiple times, even with the biggest of superstars that I had a chance of playing with. And now from a different perspective, last couple of years I had a chance to be involved in a project that you know, had something to do with Croatian football national team. So I was looking from the outside in and I was trying to kind of, you know, feel people out and saying like, locker room is a sacred place. Like if you're a player, you really don't want, when your pulse is above 180 and all of a sudden there's a camera in your face. I know that's something that obviously audience is dying for, for that moment in which, you know, a player says something to a coach. But it really changes the dynamic in the room. And I'm really looking, I mean, it's interesting to see how it's gonna develop because I feel like we're at the PO point of no return, so you can't really take the cameras out of the locker rooms anymore. Not only that, they're gonna stay there and demand more access. Now you're gonna have cameras obviously, on players as they play whether through lenses, whether through wearables. I think that's the direction we're heading in. So it's gonna be interesting to see how all of that is gonna affect the dynamics, the psychology, the conversations, the culture of the conversation in the room. Because even now. Within the few generations with all the political correctness going on, coaches can't really talk to players like they used to talk to the players. I mean, I'm a part of the old school generation that had two backboards smashed against my head when I was a kid because coach got mad at me. So he just literally smashed you know, a whiteboard on my head. For me, it was
multitrack_HandMic1:Great, great television though,
multitrack_HandMic3:yeah, and it would've been great television. It would've been, you know, primetime content. And for me it taught me a lot. And the mistake I did when I did get a whiteboard smashed on my head, I never did it again in my career. Rest assured, rest assured, yeah, that was for another mistake. But you can't really do that anymore. So, you know, now with all access, with cameras, with people watching, that's gonna be very interesting to see how it unfolds and how it's gonna affect the development of players as well, because it's not the same. And sorry for taking forever with my answer, but it's not the same if I ask a player to do something nicely. I would really need you to set this screen at this angle because I feel like this would really benefit our team. No one really, you can't really talk like that in the finals. There's 20,000 people screaming at you. They're dying for, they're thirsty for your blood. There's cameras everywhere. You know, your, your teammates are making you nervous. You missed a couple of shots. You're not gonna say frame it like that. You're just, you just won't. So it's gonna be interesting to see the culture and the dynamics of the conversation change moving forward.
multitrack_HandMic5:I'm, I'm very keen to say something because I, I mean, I have an opinion on that and, and I think, yeah, the youth has come up with cameras in their face. They, they're very different experience. So indeed, for somebody who's, who's come from a, let's say, non-native perspective, this is going to be very weird. But for, I think for the new players, they will be, they've been around cameras all the time. They're used to being filmed all the time. That's their reality. They're actually not even perceived that conflict. So I think this transition might actually be a lot easier than what we expect it to be, because this whole new generation just has never seen anything else. This is just normal.
multitrack_HandMic1:just when you get to, just to finish off this little bit that
multitrack_HandMic2:that
multitrack_HandMic1:sport and I, it'll come as a shock to you that I'm not a triathlete. Okay.
multitrack_HandMic5:Shocked.
multitrack_HandMic1:But, alright. I thought I offered it up, but it didn't, didn't maybe you to jump in like
multitrack_HandMic5:that.
multitrack_HandMic1:But it is quite a difficult sport to follow. I, you know, in terms of, of the detail and. There's a tech data question and where that feeds in. So we've talked about the sort of cameras in the, in the secret rooms, but when they're out there running, actually I want as much information as I can get.
multitrack_HandMic5:Okay. I, I would say you want more narrative. I'm not sure you want more data. Always. I think something, there's something here where we're. If we talk about sports and entertainment, what I'm looking at, for example, as a sport of triathlon, we've introduced a team format. And the opportunity for me here is suddenly we put a coach there and that coach can create a narrative that coach can tell what's happening to an audience that is not educated. That coach can also be a very colorful person because sometimes the athlete who's a fantastic athlete, because he's not the most colorful person, right? So that coach can add that can add that value to the layer cake. And I think for me it's not always about the data. I think the data is great for hardcore fans, but I think ultimately for as a smaller sport, we want to convert and create new fans. So it's much more about narrative and perspective. So we do a lot of giving context, supporting our commentators to have the right context, creating new actors in the game by such as coaches and having them talk to it and making the sports more accessible. So it's more about narrative than, for me, it's about data. I,
multitrack_HandMic4:I wanted to bring up Ilona Maher for that reason, because Ilona Maher after I, I discovered her during the Olympics when the USA women's rugby team were were victorious. And again, she is, she's a natural in terms of a creator athlete. But what was really interesting was then seeing her come over to the UK to play play for Bristol Bears for three months. And in one of the games they streamed at the Bristol Bears Game live on YouTube. And I had the comments scrolling and I was reading them and the number of people that were saying, I've never watched rugby before, and it's because of a Ilona Maher. That was really interesting to me, observing people actually, she brought new audience, not just to Bristol Bears, but into watching the game of rugby. And what was really interesting too was the commentator was. Almost explaining things a little bit too literally. But again, I kept seeing in the comments, I didn't know that. I didn't know that. And I thought it was fascinating how it was not only free, free to air, essentially, because it was being streamed on YouTube, but it was, they were there because of a l and ma and the commentators were then facilitating bringing new audience into rugby. I thought that was really fascinating.
multitrack_HandMic1:that is a really difficult question. That balance between, well, I get that on full swing, the golf one. I like golf and I know about golf and I find the commentary really annoying because it's not targeting me. And I wonder sometimes how it's targeting someone, but they don't know anything about golf, but they're watching a golf
multitrack_HandMic2:It's, it's, it's a balance. I think when, when, when whisper, when we try and do a new sport or even an existing sport. So when we do, we. We're about to start our first ever Roland Garros coverage world world feed in, in, in obviously in a couple of weeks. And it is always that balance between, you know, everyone knows tennis, but not everyone knows tennis to the level of an expert. And, but you don't want to dumb it down. So finding that balance between reminding, you know, and again, we talk about golf, so, you know, whether it's I am no golf and so I want them to focus on how bloody hard it is to hit a ball like this big 300 yards. But you know,'cause people who don't play golf think it's easy, right? When we do Formula E, you know, the speed trying to. Convey speed on television is actually very, very hard. Anyone who's been to a Formula One race or even a Formula E race or anything that these things are little rockets. And yet, when you see on television, it's really hard to, when people say G-Force, people don't really ever get, unless I'm mistaken, probably most people have not been subjected to three or four Gs as you know, on a daily couch. It's really hard. And so to, to tell those stories and get that information across, I think is the challenge for any live broadcaster.
multitrack_HandMic5:No, I think, sorry to jump in here because I do, I do think data is, is, is very important, but I think. Ultimately, again, it goes back to the same question you have. You have your distribution channel, let's say mainstream television for us as a, as a point of we want to attract a new audience. So the information, the story, the narrative is key, important, but there are so many challenge, so, channels. So what's to stop us from creating a dedicated YouTube channel with an expert commentator who talks about the, what's the power, the, the cadence, the heart rate, and all that stuff that is there for a very dedicated audience. So if we talk about post produced content, we have longer form content that does deep dive analytics. There's a very dedicated audience to that, that will watch 15 minutes evaluating the power profile of, of a specific athlete throughout this race. Whether that is for mainstream television, when you want to convert a wider audience, probably not. There is more about narrative. So I think it's, it, it goes back to the same strategy. What do you do where, and I think that's actually again, the opportunity because with so many different channels out there, we actually have the opportunity to deliver for specific audiences and segment them accordingly.
multitrack_HandMic1:Joe, I wanna talk about, there's a, there's a question here. I was, I was, we did a thing last week. So last week two circles. Sports agency in, in well lots of places now, but they released a very interesting report and it was about sports, intellectual property and the value of the revenue generated and essentially the sports business in that sense is, that's what it is. It's, you know, monetization of, of ip.
multitrack_HandMic5:There's a question
multitrack_HandMic1:coming from what the whole room really is. If we were starting a billion dollar sport, the next billion dollar sport, what, what would we do? Where would we start it? And I'll be interested in your views. I might poke a few of you you know, metaphorically with a question. But Joe,
multitrack_HandMic4:when
multitrack_HandMic1:when I look at things like and Roblox for example, and you can imagine how Ill at ease I am, you know, in that environment.
multitrack_HandMic5:but
multitrack_HandMic1:feels like an IP machine. They're generating IP and it just flows and they're creating and they're moving and they're moving it forward. Different audiences just take us inside that world because
multitrack_HandMic5:from the
multitrack_HandMic1:IOC down the, the world of sport is looking at that and thinking, okay, well we need to be there, but how do we show up? What do we do? Aren't we gonna look stupid? Are they gonna steal our ip? Is it all about, you know, we're we've sold category exclusivity over here. Is this gonna ruin it? Just take us inside that bit. Who
multitrack_HandMic4:it. Who, who knows Roblox for a start? Who's ever been stung by their kids to buy Roblox?
multitrack_LecternAmbiance:Roblox?
multitrack_HandMic4:More than a few of you. Yes. So yeah, Roblox is what's called a social gaming platform. So the best parallel to draw is that it's like the YouTube of gaming. It's a low-code platform, so it's relatively easy to spin up an experience there. And much like YouTube, there are over 5 million active experiences. They're called experiences, not games on Roblox, even though some of them are are games. What's really interesting is, again, it's social gaming, so we come back to being there, but experience in experiencing something as a collective, whether it's dress to impress, which is a dress up your avatar fashion game, or its Blue Lock Rivals, which is the biggest soccer game on the platform. What is interesting in terms of, so sports is, is very prevalent on the platform. 500 million hours of sports games were played last year. Very few of them are official federation games. Because you mentioned exclusivity. Normally simulation rights in gaming have been given away and they're locked away, so you can't really
multitrack_HandMic1:again, that they, you know, this, I keep pointing at this. It's not, I'm not talking about the roof, but I'm just talking about Olympic world here. That's. Exclusivity is media of sponsorship has created this world, hasn't it? This is, that's where the money has come from, essentially.
multitrack_HandMic4:Yeah, and and that's one of the dichotomies I see as being someone who has come from the world of IP management, but more in kids entertainment. How they have acknowledged the shift from, it's not exclusive to Nick Jr. Anymore. It has to be on the Nick Jr YouTube channel. They've now started commissioning content and putting it on YouTube because they've realized that everything everywhere, all at once makes all boats rise. And actually the way to cut through in this attention, attention economy that we all work in is. Not to lock things away. Scarcity does not equal value anymore. It equals anonymity. Nobody wants that. So, but how that manifests on Roblox is either those federations or clubs can't show up there because the, the gay, the rights are locked away. Paris and Shaman, for example, they wanted to go onto Roblox. They created an experience on Roblox, but you couldn't kick a football in there because those football simulation rights were locked away. So you had to do a treasure hunt around Paris and collect feathers, you know, not the best way to en engage with Paris Sandman. But the other thing is showing up natively there. And that's the interesting shift that I see because you've got Blue Lock rivals, the biggest soccer game on the platform, made by a fan developer who also likes anime. So he smooshed together football and anime and has got a, an experience that's bringing in millions of dollars and it's got 250,000 concurrent players in at any one time. FIFA go onto the platform and. I assume that they thought that the fact that they were just called FIFA and they were particularly successful in gaming elsewhere, was gonna equal success on the platform. It didn't, I'm afraid it died. Horrible death versus those fanm made games because this is where the onus is on showing up authentically, doing your homework, rolling your sleeves up, getting into that platform and knowing what works for the audience there. And that is, that's something that not a lot of federations and rights owners have really gotten their head around yet. The power is now with the audience, I'm afraid, and they know the value of their attention and they will wield it against you if it's not right.
multitrack_HandMic1:So you've got a whole world there and it, you know, and it's sort of sitting there waiting and the sports industry is saying, right, okay. We need to sort of get in there back to that question of where the next sports are coming at. And Michael, I'm when I look at these new sports, and I'm not bracketing super try necessarily in that bracket, but you've got things like we've mentioned baller League, we've got Kings League, we've got the, are sort of football ish type, you know, products. We've got unrivaled, we've got, I think someone counted, there's about 60 odd that have just been launched this year. So new things that are predicated on not targeting television, but are targeting this audience or YouTube starting there, starting on TikTok and working back. Is that what the investment community in terms of, in sport, there's a lot of money floating around sport that want to buy IP and monetize it, but is that where they're going? Can you see a playbook across these new sports? And there's, there's an ultimate question about whether you think it's gonna work, but let's park that for a minute.
multitrack_HandMic5:Is
multitrack_HandMic1:Is there an investor playbook? Is there a sort of McKinsey type sort of, approach to sport and what does that mean?
multitrack_HandMic3:I
multitrack_HandMic5:it's a trend that changes often. I, I would think many of those new, new leagues, if they go after media, they focus typically on the, on the same kind of pre soccer, the same big sports that have already have a big media attention and, and kind of try to. Take a piece of that cake. I, I generally don't think as, as new leagues for us, as super try, for example, triathlon, the, the aspiration to ever make money, big money out of media rights is probably, is probably unrealistic. I think the media, media money will, if it remains the same, it'll, it'll focus on a smaller group of, of sports,
multitrack_HandMic1:the big, get bigger
multitrack_HandMic5:that, that have large, large audiences. I think for us, and I think invest investors also start looking at that is, okay what is your audience? How, how well do you know your audience? How engaged are they, they with you? How passionate are they about you? And I think that there's a lot of value in, in the audience itself and, and, and actually directly monetizing that rather than, than going after the, the media outlets that, that, that, that just look at the quantum of the, or the size of your audience.
multitrack_HandMic1:I wonder, Matt, there's a question here about the entertainment side of things. When you look at it as a television, sort of entertainment professional producer, does it work? Do they work as entertainment
multitrack_HandMic2:Well, I think I would, the only thing I'd slightly say differently is if you're talking about build a new billion dollar sport, I think all of those things you mentioned are all derivatives of, of existing sports. So, you know, football ball or league. I think the main thing for me and is, you know, the amount of times over the last year, 18 months when you know, you know, someone's, oh, I whisper. We'd love to talk to you about what you can do to, for paddle tennis. Well, paddle tennis is a massively successful participation sport. It, it, it is hard. It's a participation sport at the moment. Broadcast is it, it it's restricted because of, of, of how it is. Same with pickleball, you know, participation is one thing. Get into building the courts is probably how you're gonna make your millions in, in paddle tennis right now, because at the moment that doesn't quite work. But to Joe's point earlier, things like Baller League obviously. They've taken those format points that, you know, I come from a sort of a, an entertainment format background, and so I'm always looking to apply formats and structure to to, to sports. You know, and, and the conditions are now, right, for taking things and tweaking them, giving fans a say in what happens, I think is really key. And if you had suggested that 10 years ago, that's, that's lunacy. And even, you know, but, but the things I wouldn't do, and this sounds quite negative, is, is think that you know best and, and it, it, it's extraordinary. But if you look at the TGL, the things that the PGA tour launched sort of as a way of obviously rewarding the players that didn't go to live. I think it's fairly obvious why they did it. You know, I just felt that, that on paper, I don't think if any of us had pitched out would've got passed. The first, you know, the, the, the pitch you did earlier, so it's really hard. You've gotta know your audience don't think you know best and, and make sure that the stars are doing it are gonna feed the beast regularly in terms of social media and content. Whereas some of the golfers respectfully turning up on that event once every couple of weeks and then not posting about it until the next one. I just think that's why that, that particular format, I think has got a fair bit of work to do.
multitrack_HandMic5:So
multitrack_HandMic1:so it's gonna come from somewhere else. My billion dollar idea, I'm not gonna steal it by the way. You can have it, but right. We gonna, at this point, I wonder if we have a microphone to hand. Do we have a, that can roam the ro roam the room. That's not easy to say. Anyone. If you can just sort of make yourself known if you've got a question for the group or if you want to just build on something that was, has been said or you wanna make a general point, I will take those at this point. Okay. We've got one
multitrack_HandMic5:gentleman
multitrack_HandMic1:over there
multitrack_HandMic5:There you go.
multitrack_HandMic1:you might wanna have to shout. Actually shout it out and then I will repeat it. But just tell us who you are. Oh, we got a mic. Thank you, Damian.
multitrack_HandMic5:We go.
multitrack_HandMic3:Hello. Thank you so much for the insightful discussion. I'm me by the way. I'm currently studying with A-I-S-T-S sports management. So this question is for the ma'am. She said that she looks at the children's behavior. As a leading indicator in terms of how things will be moving. It's just a follow up on that, that is it a leading indicator or it's a latent demand that is being created by the companies to make children fence. So the stickiness of that sport for those childrens is higher during the lifespan and they can earn more. So is it just a leading indicator or it's a little more deep than that?
multitrack_HandMic4:that's an excellent question. I think it's probably somewhere in the middle. I like, I like to think that, you know, kids are already in the future business. We're just trying to catch them up and, and very often they don't use. Platforms or apps in the way they were intended to, you know, they're great tinkerers and actually that's therein lies the insight that, that we can learn from. What is interesting is obviously the habits that they're developing now, they're not gonna turn 18, get their first credit card and then all switch to subscribing to platforms that they haven't been used to subscribing to because they've been social first, YouTube kind of TikTok fans. So for me it is that bellwether of, for direction of travel. And if anything we are in, it's incumbent on us that work in sports to look at that signaling now and start trying to evolve and reorient the media, the business models, to fit that in the future.
multitrack_HandMic1:Yes. Gentlemen over there. Yeah. He can have mine. My name is Roma. I'm from the voters arena. I have a question for you, Michael. You,
multitrack_HandMic5:you,
multitrack_HandMic1:you, you mentioned talking about your business model. I, I want to know how you make your money to be very clear. You, you mentioned that you are not making money out of the media rights. Can you give more depth on how do you monetize the community and, and how this is revenue generated revenue generation for you?
multitrack_HandMic5:Well, similar to pickleball, I guess, this participation is, is a, is a major revenue stream. Tra traditionally already for triathlon obviously, and then it's, and then there's sponsorships there's a host, venue rights. It's, it's about the audiences we bring together. So these are the, the three main ones I would say.
multitrack_HandMic1:Right. Okay. Actually, I'm gonna go up here. Look, look at me moving.
multitrack_LecternAmbiance:This
multitrack_HandMic1:exciting. Have never been into the audience before.
multitrack_HandMic5:His new triathlon. Yeah,
multitrack_HandMic1:Here you go. Slide down here. Go up here. Hi. I'm Marta Singer or Todd Singer recently joined the FEI, the Equestrian Federation. This is kind of a question for all of you, maybe more. So, Matt I have a background in at the US Federation and sponsorships, but also. With the media company and with the, you mentioned F1 and with the new shows with the Polo show on Netflix as well as the Race for the Crown Show you know, being in sales and partnerships with the equestrian side and our sport. I don't know. How would you, what are your thoughts on the Polo and the race for the Crown,
multitrack_HandMic5:Show.
multitrack_HandMic2:I think the race of, the race of the Crown, if I'm not mis that's the, the following, the three this around the's, around the three.
multitrack_HandMic3:Kentucky
multitrack_HandMic5:meeting.
multitrack_HandMic2:And I think from what I've seen, it's not about, it's about the, the same thing. It's the personalities. It's the WI think it's the, again, if I've got this wrong, apologize. It's the wealthy owners and the kind of larger than life characters that are, you know, you you, they're using the racing as a way into this window of the sort of super rich and,
multitrack_HandMic1:yeah,
multitrack_HandMic2:and not, I was gonna say famous, but they probably are doing the show because they either are or want to be famous. So I think it's, it's what's the storytelling? And also I think, again, I think it's about four or five parts episodes in the season, which, which I think is important, but it's less so about, it sort of goes back to this whole point without getting too grand. Sport is entertainment. It's the purest form of entertainment in my, in my. World. Whether that's documentaries, branded content, being there in an in a, in an being there in an arena or watching on tv. And I think a lot of these things, it's just what's your way into the sport? And in that particular one, will it make more people go and watch horse racing? I don't know, but that's sort of not the point. Will people do Netflix or, or whoever The streamer I care. No, as long as it means more people watch their shows, the better. But I, I think it's about storytelling ultimately.
multitrack_HandMic1:Yeah, exactly. Thank you. Yeah. The, the last episode. And that also follows a female, female athlete in that sport. So I think that's just something to, to bring in mind. Thank you very much. Right. While I'm here, I'm gonna stay here. Can I uh, from the, oh, pardon me. Perfect.
multitrack_HandMic3:ahead. I just have a question because we talk about sports and entertainment and I feel like there are sports that have come into the limelight a little bit later on, or been even created such as like CrossFit and High Rocks, which is, you know, when we talk about entertainment, you can't open your phone without seeing anything about High Rocks at the moment. Is these kind of sports, you think it's more like a trend when it comes to promoting or entertainment? Or do you think like there's capacity for it to like gain this momentum or compared to like more like the classic sports? I would say
multitrack_HandMic5:there's also,
multitrack_HandMic1:the, it's a really good question because I, I've, it's one that it sort of conflates with something I was gonna ask, which is the participation, what action is, what we want people to do and obviously we want kids to, to do sport. That's the final bit of the jigsaw, but high rocks, it's almost like they're going the other way, aren't they? They're big, they're. People are doing stuff and then it's evoke turning into a media property.
multitrack_HandMic5:That right? Is that, yeah, I, I I would say it's, it's a participation sport and I think all the media around it is, this is just as a promotion to, to sell tickets ultimately. Right. But yes, indeed, it's, I think it's, it's ultimately banked on the on, on the. On the rise of participation of the, of the, I think a lot of, I see my kids, they all want to, they all actually care a lot about their health, about their fitness. They're very much more into, into an active lifestyle. And I think, yeah, the, now there is a lot of opportunities out there where the CrossFit, high Rocks trail, running, running to do, to participate. And ultimately these, the participation sports use media to promote themselves and to, to tell the stories of the people, of the benefits, the values, and what they live for.
multitrack_HandMic2:participating.
multitrack_HandMic1:there's a, what's the, the basketball story in terms of like the, that link between.
multitrack_HandMic4:the
multitrack_HandMic5:entertainment product at
multitrack_HandMic1:top. So the television product and then the journey to the NBA or wherever, the Euro League or whatever, you know, and you've played in every, or virtually every, I think
multitrack_HandMic5:I think
multitrack_HandMic2:Pretty much every level of basketball known to human being except NBA development league. Thank God I never played there. So all the lowest levels of Croatian League, all the way up to NBA and everything in between. So yeah, the road was long and it was, you know, it, it taught me a lot. But I would go back to basically the question how deeply is the sport gonna be engraved in the society into the pop culture? I think all of these are trends mostly, but we spoke about it earlier in the preparation for the panel. Mr. Beast has been around for 13 years, but now he has that fan base, so nothing really happens overnight. And when you think of. Big sports, obviously like basketball, they have been around for a hundred years, a hundred plus years. So, you know, obviously we can only guess at, at how it's gonna develop, whether a new sport is gonna come along and really take over. I mean, we're still yet to be determined if Paddle is gonna stick around for, for how many years. You know, paddle is obviously, obviously, you know, one of the hottest things in the world right now, but it's yet to be seen. Let's talk about Paddle in 10 or 15 or 20 years.
multitrack_HandMic1:I'm interested in the politics around Paddle. I mean in terms of it, its relationship to tennis. If I'm running a tennis association I apologies if someone in here is running a tennis association, but I'm wondering if Paddle is a friend or enemy or frenemy in terms of that number of people. Are people migrating away from tennis to paddle or are they is Paddle? It's been initially framed as a funnel, you know, top of funnel product for tennis, tennis being the proper thing, and paddle being a sort of lightweight imitation. Has anyone played Paddle here, by the way? Before I start going off? Get beaten up on the way out,
multitrack_HandMic5:out.
multitrack_HandMic2:it? Your, isn't it the sort of the a hundred or T 20 to your test? Cricket? Again, for anyone who's not English, that probably means nothing. But it's more, I think paddle is, I think it was your point. I mean, people play with their families, you know, it's a, it's a great way into a sport. And I personally as, as, as a father of three, I think any sport that I get to play with my kids and with my wife and with my friends, I think is great. And, and someone mentioned the lady here about high rocks and, and CrossFit. I think anything that is encouraging people to be more active and get out and do more things. And if I think in the next few years you see the cream of the crop in those sports, undoubtedly there will be some, there is at the moment, I'm sure. But I think that the viewing figures around watching the best in anything in the world compete that will happen,
multitrack_HandMic1:which is the problem with paddle, isn't it, on television as a, it's not very interesting to watch, is it?
multitrack_HandMic2:Yeah, because I think it's just hard to, it's, it's quite nuanced. It's a game. I don't recognize chasing around hot and sweaty in a court in Portugal or whatever in, in the summer holidays versus elite level paddle. That's, I something I can't quite relate to that.
multitrack_HandMic4:I was just gonna make the point that you know, when, again, when we come back to kids, we see that kids have got more fandoms than ever before, which is not surprising'cause they've got access to more things than ever before. So it's not necessarily as a zero sum game or one has to drive to the other. Actually, there, there was a recent report done by an agency called Super Awesome that polled US teens and US teens were asked about fandoms that nobody else in their circle. Had and 74% of them said they were a fan of something that no one else in their close circle were also a fan of. So we see that fragmentation, but that's okay. I think that we've just gotta get comfortable with that and just acknowledge that that fragmentation of fandom comes with the tech and, and the platforms that are available now.
multitrack_HandMic5:Now
multitrack_HandMic1:Joe Redfin and Earned Nuance. Who wants nuance? We want binary arouses and we, sorry, I don't really, yeah. Question from here.
multitrack_HandMic3:thanks. I've, I'm Todd Harpo from Stanford University Sports Equity Lab. I hear a lot of trends that you're talking about, a lot of sort of unifying themes about access over ownership, for instance, no longer just breadth, but also depth, maybe no longer just watching, but also creating and doing. But as an anthropologist, it gives me, it gives me great pleasure to hear the constant refrain that it's about the narrative and it's about storytelling. And it's about, you know, that most basic of entertainment is storytelling. And yes, I think in, in this context, might it be a little bit about curatorial choice, but even that, I think we're starting to hear more voice when we start hearing more people, you know, talk about it. I mean, yes, I'll watch like the. The Tour de France show, but then I go on REMCOs channel to see how Remco trains, you know,'cause I want to go a notch deeper. And that is very much the kind of model of the building we're in right now. You know, we all read at the sixth grade level, you know, primary school level, that's the big words. You wanna do the next click down, then go to the, the sub channel on YouTube or wherever else. What, what's next? Where's it going to go? Will it stay storytelling all the way down?
multitrack_HandMic4:down. I think what's really interesting, thinking about what you're saying, and we were talking about it in, in earlier in prep for the panel, is that we all like different kinds of stories, right? Different tones of voice. And that's the beauty for me of platforms like YouTube. We were talking about it in the context of n of the NBA. The NBA only used to make available 50 hours of live content each season to its creators. And they've realized now the power of creators to tell the story in their particular way, their tone of voice, their phraseology, and each one has got a devoted audience to the extent now that they've curated. They're, they're they've, they've gotta create a lab and they're now letting 2,500 hours of live content be available, making them available to them, and 25,000 hours from the last 10 years. So they've opened up the archive as well because they've, they've acknowledged that actually that that storytelling can take many forms and those creators as a method of distribution and putting their, each, their spin on it on on that content is really, really powerful. So, yeah, it's about storytelling, but it's about the different ways you can connect through storytelling, and particularly where kids are concerned. You know, kids love stories. That's how fandom is passed down, whether you're a fan of crochet photography or basketball. So for me, you know, in when I was young, the stories came through the pages of magazines. It was the deep dive, the interview with your favorite Athlete. Now it's just done on YouTube, YouTube.
multitrack_HandMic1:right here. Sorry, the conversation might have moved on a little bit, but just back to that earlier point, are we not conflating as well a little bit consumption and participation in, in some of these points? You, you spoke about paddle and and tennis, but if you look at, take something like the NFL, let's say, where I think it's the most consumed sport as in terms of pure entertainment, but maybe someone can correct the statistics, but the least played sport from an adult perspective in terms of participation. And I wonder if you have some thoughts on that. You know, those two things necessarily aren't correlated. Growing the consumption of a sport and, and the social media element of it, let's say, and we've seen golf struggle a lot, golf's the golf players have used this growing the game slogan, but it's actually been about growing the size of the pie in terms of financial return in them trying to grow the game and participation and growth. An audience has not been. Linked at all. I dunno, is there any maybe reaction to that or,
multitrack_HandMic2:I just want, I, I mean, this is my personal, totally personal opinion, and there's literally zero data or research behind this, but I do wonder if, because the, the NFL season is relatively short, it feels like a bit more of a treat. If that's the right word. You know, I think the way that it, you know, whilst it's been around for a long, long time, it's only really, obviously with, with what Brett Gosper Hass done in NFL Europe, it, it's now it feels like it's, the globalization is actually relatively recent. I think the timing is everything. The perfect storm of it being a sport that it feels, it, they've got the entertainment right. I think when you watch we were saying earlier, I'm a big fan of creating in arena experiences. I think when I talk about content creators, we talk about Mr. Beast, we talk about other, I think that every single rights sold, every single federation should see every single person who buys a ticket as a content creator, 50,000 people in your stadium give them content creation opportunities. Half an hour, 45 minutes before the game starts. Right. That, that for me, I think is, is, is huge and but to your point also about participation, there's just different ways around it. I and I, I don't think we're anywhere close to saturation of any sport at all.
multitrack_HandMic5:I think it's, it's ultimately, like you said, it's, it is growing the pie, right? And then it's a, and then you have narratives, you have different content creators, but it's, it's, I guess in, in the pie. Then there's ways of monetizing it. And I think the sport will grow as, as there's more people who can monetize what they do. Whether you empower content creators, they are able to monetize it. Or whether there's a rights holder who can monetize the eyeballs or whether there is an element of participation who can monetize the participation side of things or ticket sales. But yeah, I think as a sport, obviously we want to grow as big as possible because endemically, we'll then have more ways to monetize it. But who will monetize it and how to monetize it. There's a lot of questions there, I think.
multitrack_HandMic1:I think that's, you know, it's a good place to finish.'cause I think actually it's the question that, you know, what is action at the bottom of the funnel? We talk a lot about moving kids. I, it used to be the television. The television was the top of the funnel when you got them watching television and you sort of drove them towards participation, that was what the whole thing was about. Now whether that actually worked and how often how they were converted I think is another question. But now it's just so messier and the funnel as a sort of visual representation of what's happening is I think a flawed one. And I think people are starting to question, you know, that. But I think it's a really interesting question that, and it's a whole sort of, it's whole conference on its own almost. But in terms of what ha does any of this noise lead to participation or are they less related than we like to think? It's a tricky one and I won't get you to answer the question now'cause we've run outta time and Anna is like going. Don't start asking big questions at nine minutes past four, right? wanna thank our panel. Please give'em a round of applause. Great effort. And just final word. If you don't know unofficial partner, look it up. It's a yellow thing on your sort of Spotify. Wherever your Apple podcast, wherever you get podcasts, have a look. It's these sorts of conversations. You get the gist, but it's good. Thanks very much for your time.